The Eighty-Dollar Champion - Elizabeth Letts [82]
When Harry came into the ring for the jump-off, nobody was paying attention except Johanna and the children. But Snowman, seemingly unperturbed by the rain, sailed around the course for another clean round. When First Chance came into the ring, she flew around the course, too. Back came the jump crew, scurrying around to raise the bars higher. Now the height was a daunting five feet, six inches.
On this round, First Chance knocked down a pole, but Snowman went clean. Johanna and the children jumped up from their seats in delight. The plow horse had won another blue ribbon. Maybe the victory at Sands Point hadn’t been a fluke after all.
The next class up was the green jumpers. This class was limited to horses in their first year of competition. Since Snowman had been to a show the previous fall, he was not eligible. Harry was riding Night Arrest and Wayward Wind. The rain continued steadily, and helmetless Harry just kept riding. When the water dripped down his forehead, he wiped it away with the arm of his tweed jacket. At the end of the green jumpers, Harry had collected another two ribbons for Hollandia—a blue for Night Arrest and a second-place red for Wayward Wind.
When Saturday dawned, a steady summer downpour still was hammering the show grounds. The rain had deterred all but the most dedicated spectators. Men wore tweed hats and mackintoshes; women carried black umbrellas and wore muckers to wade through the mud.
While the footing in the big arena on the polo field had been decent the day before, today it was soupy, the worst possible conditions for jumping. The sandy ring surface collected large puddles. The most dangerous situation for a jumping horse is unsure footing—sliding on takeoff would ensure a crash; perhaps even worse, sliding on landing could bring a horse to the ground, possibly crushing a rider’s leg underneath his thousand-pound body. Often, the worst injuries to riders occurred when a horse fell, then hit the rider’s unprotected head with his iron-shod hooves as he was scrambling to his feet.
But Harry was not worried about the footing. He had years of experience riding with the Knox girls out in the hilly wooded fields around Smithtown with the hunt. Knowing that his mount was sure-footed and used to galloping in rain and even snow, over muddy bogs and sandy flats, made him trust his horse. Harry was confident that Snowman, more than any other competitor, would be comfortable galloping through the soupy sand.
The first class of the morning was the knock-down-and-out class, where any competitor who knocked down a pole would be eliminated. Snowman went clean on the first round, and Harry found himself back in a jump-off against First Chance. But then Snowman couldn’t seem to hit his stride and ended up taking a pole down.
Harry was happy with the red ribbon, and he patted the horse on the neck as he exited the ring.
The grooms kept busy, scraping mud off the horses between each round. In the next class, Andante, who had not been jumping well, turned in a clean performance to win. The de Leyers were not disappointed in Snowman’s performance. They clapped and applauded louder than anyone in the sparse crowd each time Snowman got another ribbon. There were seven classes leading up to the championship, and so far, Snowman had won a ribbon in all of them.
On the last day of the show, the rain clouds finally broke up, and by Sunday afternoon, the sun was streaming down on the polo field where the big jumps were set up for the championship classes.
Harry drops the reins over the fence, to the amazement of the crowd. (illustration credits 15.1)
Harry stood by the side of the ring, surveying the course. Today, the families who had stayed home on Friday and Saturday had come out to see the show, and the atmosphere was festive. Snowman seemed to like performing in front of a crowd.
Going into the stakes class, two horses were vying for the title: Snowman and First Chance. Whichever horse won the class would bring home the show championship.